Blix Not Bombs review – former UN weapons inspector revisits the Iraq war
At the age of 97, entirely lucid, still writing books and physically spry enough to be shown swimming in a Norwegian lake, former UN weapons inspector Hans Blix has given an extended interview to the Czech-born Swedish film-maker Greta Stocklassová about his life and times, about George W Bush Jr, Saddam Hussein and the weapons of mass destruction that were not there. The result is insightful and a vivid time capsule for the grim and mendacious era of the 'war on terror', during which Blix was tasked with discovering the truth about Saddam's supposed weapons. The film is also unexpectedly spiky, with Blix at one stage threatening to walk out, as Stocklassová presses him on his apparent fence-sitting, then as now, insisting on an absence of evidence for WMD but also reluctant to commit himself definitively to this being evidence of absence, and apparently unable to state where the onus of proof lies.
But as he himself says … how do you prove a negative? How do you prove that there is not a mouse in this room at this very moment? After 9/11, Blix found himself at the very centre of international pain and American dysfunction, with the US government grimly set on finding someone to lash out against, and Saddam's Iraq, already semi-defeated in the first Gulf war of 1991, being the obvious candidate. America needed the fiction of Iraq's 'weapons of mass destruction' as the pretext – although it was presmably their absolute conviction that there were no WMD that emboldened them to attack. (Osama Bin Laden was actually discovered in Pakistan, a nuclear power on whom regime change could not be imposed.)
So Blix – calm, professional, conscientious and diplomatic, showing up at various Iraqi sites with his UN team in the burning heat and finding nothing – was the face of this objective, non-partisan assessment. He didn't realise until it was too late, and perhaps still doesn't realise, that the protracted theatre of his polite frustration was being used by the US government to build up the necessary drumbeat of rage to facilitate the final assault: Blix the dupe, Blix the chump, Blix the internationalist liberal being laughed at by Saddam.
Stocklassová suggests that over the 20 years since then, the calamity of the Iraq war led to the rise of Islamic State, to the tidal wave of refugees and to the new mainstream normalisation of the far right. She could be correct. Yet Blix's inspections seem part of a different world; certainly Putin didn't feel the need to go through the motions of a UN inspector who could confirm or fail to disprove his allegations of a Nazified Ukraine aggressor. Blix himself is good-natured and decent; his faith in the primacy of facts still has something heroic about it.
Blix Not Bombs is on True Story from 13 June.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Guardian
19 hours ago
- The Guardian
Blix Not Bombs review – former UN weapons inspector revisits the Iraq war
At the age of 97, entirely lucid, still writing books and physically spry enough to be shown swimming in a Norwegian lake, former UN weapons inspector Hans Blix has given an extended interview to the Czech-born Swedish film-maker Greta Stocklassová about his life and times, about George W Bush Jr, Saddam Hussein and the weapons of mass destruction that were not there. The result is insightful and a vivid time capsule for the grim and mendacious era of the 'war on terror', during which Blix was tasked with discovering the truth about Saddam's supposed weapons. The film is also unexpectedly spiky, with Blix at one stage threatening to walk out, as Stocklassová presses him on his apparent fence-sitting, then as now, insisting on an absence of evidence for WMD but also reluctant to commit himself definitively to this being evidence of absence, and apparently unable to state where the onus of proof lies. But as he himself says … how do you prove a negative? How do you prove that there is not a mouse in this room at this very moment? After 9/11, Blix found himself at the very centre of international pain and American dysfunction, with the US government grimly set on finding someone to lash out against, and Saddam's Iraq, already semi-defeated in the first Gulf war of 1991, being the obvious candidate. America needed the fiction of Iraq's 'weapons of mass destruction' as the pretext – although it was presmably their absolute conviction that there were no WMD that emboldened them to attack. (Osama Bin Laden was actually discovered in Pakistan, a nuclear power on whom regime change could not be imposed.) So Blix – calm, professional, conscientious and diplomatic, showing up at various Iraqi sites with his UN team in the burning heat and finding nothing – was the face of this objective, non-partisan assessment. He didn't realise until it was too late, and perhaps still doesn't realise, that the protracted theatre of his polite frustration was being used by the US government to build up the necessary drumbeat of rage to facilitate the final assault: Blix the dupe, Blix the chump, Blix the internationalist liberal being laughed at by Saddam. Stocklassová suggests that over the 20 years since then, the calamity of the Iraq war led to the rise of Islamic State, to the tidal wave of refugees and to the new mainstream normalisation of the far right. She could be correct. Yet Blix's inspections seem part of a different world; certainly Putin didn't feel the need to go through the motions of a UN inspector who could confirm or fail to disprove his allegations of a Nazified Ukraine aggressor. Blix himself is good-natured and decent; his faith in the primacy of facts still has something heroic about it. Blix Not Bombs is on True Story from 13 June.
Channel 4
2 days ago
- Channel 4
Sir Attenborough's new film calls for ban on destructive fishing methods
The Prince of Wales has called for bold action to protect and restore the planet's oceans. Speaking on World Oceans Day, on the eve of the UN's Ocean Conference, Prince William said the clock was ticking towards the 30/30 target – which aims to protect 30 percent of the world's land and sea by the year 2030. The problem of over-fishing is highlighted in Sir David Attenborough's new documentary – which is available on Disney Plus. The film has galvanised calls to ban destructive fishing methods – while tomorrow the government will announce proposals to protect more vulnerable areas of English seas from a harmful practice known as bottom trawling.
BBC News
2 days ago
- BBC News
Skipton cellist visits Arctic to record sounds of climate change
The sound of Arctic wind howling through the strings of Sarah Smout's carbon fibre cello on the pack ice connected to the North Pole is like nothing she has heard joined a group of artists from all over the world on a trip to research and be inspired by the "breathtaking and absolutely vast" landscape of the Arctic musician and poet spent 16 days on board a specially-equipped ship in the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard and experienced temperatures of - said she saw climate change happening before her eyes as "cracks began to form on the ice, a large shelf broke off and we were hurried back onto the boat, no longer safe on the drifting piece of ice". Smout is using music, words and sound recordings to make her debut album, which will focus on climate change in the Arctic."Music is a brilliant way to bring people together, speak to their hearts and minds and inspire them to make decisions themselves to bring about positive change," said Smout."We are witness to the climate changing all around us, but none so dramatic and fast as in the Arctic."It might be far away but what happens there affects all of us."She said visiting Svalbard had made her more driven than ever to bring the sounds she has recorded to the wider hopes listeners will connect to what is happening in that part of the world and be encouraged to protect said her current research was about water and that she and her cello, which she has named Bernard, had been on many adventurers to explore nature."I've always been fascinated by the Arctic and I think being in places and getting a sense of the place first hand sparks my own creativity," she used a hydrophone to record under water and said the sounds she had collected, such as creaking glaciers, would speak for themselves on her album. Listen to highlights from North Yorkshire on BBC Sounds, catch up with the latest episode of Look North.
